There seems to be no end to Sacha Modolo's run of bad luck. Today the Italian crashed hard in the first stage of the Eneco Tour and even though he has suffered no fractures, he may be out of the race.

After his excellent start to the season, things haven't gone according to plan for Sacha Modolo. He crashed hard in Paris-Roubaix but seemed to be back on track when he won a stage of the Tour de Suisse.

However, he had to withdraw from the Tour de France due to illness and had now hoped to use the Tour de Pologne and the Eneco Tour to get back into shape for the autumn classics. Unfortunately, he was involved in a bad crash in today's first stage of the latter race.

After he had crossed the finish line he paid a visit to the hospital Zorgsaam in Terneuzen with team doctor Pollastri. Medical checks revealed that he suffered a concussion, but he has no fractures or serious injuries. He'll spend the night in the team hotel and in the morning the team will decide whether he will continue in the race.

With Modolo out of the running for the win, Davide Cimolai took over the role as Lampre-Merida sprinter and he did surprisingly well by taking third.

"Because of the many roundabouts, it was not easy to be near the front of the bunch in the final kilometers," he said. "When Modolo crashed, we had to regroup. With 500m to go, I understood I had to recover positions, so I started a progression that allowed me to be in the head position 200 meters from the line, where the real sprint began. I'm satisfied with the place on the podium".